


You Can’t Go Home Again

by MindNoise



Category: Adam Lambert (Musician), Tommy Ratliff (Musician)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-05
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-08-19 07:21:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16530032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MindNoise/pseuds/MindNoise
Summary: A secret experiment left Tommy with a new and dangerous ability.(I'm not a summary kind of gal. Just read on!)*I posted the first two chapters of this months ago, then lost inspiration and deleted it. It's finished now and here it is!* *Forewarned, this is a tad dark.*





	You Can’t Go Home Again

**Author's Note:**

> mood music: 
> 
> Never Land by The Sisters of Mercy (copy/paste link) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn1EpR7Xqks&index=23&list=WL&t=0s

 

1.

It’s getting dark. He looks down at the charred body on the floor. He doesn’t even remember how he got to his parents’ house. Looking for them. He’d been looking for his parents and couldn’t find them. They were gone. Like his friends.

Gone.

Tommy came here looking for his family, any family, any friends, and found a stranger instead. He knew who Tommy was, had called him by name. Then he attacked. Tommy was terrified. The stranger had wrapped his arms around Tommy’s waist in an insane, crushing hug, and began dragging him toward the back of the house. He said he would fix Tommy’s mind.

It was his fear that did it. That’s the only explanation Tommy had. The stranger’s arms dropped suddenly, as if he’d been paralyzed, and his back arched in an unnatural way. He could even hear the man’s spine snapping in several places. His mouth opened in a silent scream and his eyes threatened to pop out of their sockets. Smoke began pouring out of his open but silent mouth. Tommy smelled burning flesh and it turned his stomach. He watched the stranger’s skin turn black and crisp. Then he’d fallen to the floor, nothing more than a mass of scorched flesh. Tommy stares at the body. It’s still smoking, still bubbling and popping in places.

It’s getting dark.

 _Hurry_ , the voice in his head tells him. _There will be more just like him._

Tommy knows this is true. He runs to the door, not wanting to leave his parents’ home without them, but knowing he must. He steps outside. It’s close to dusk, and an eerie fog has settled. It’s like looking through a cobweb veil, white and thin with the edge of darkness creeping in silently. The air is unnaturally still. He hears nothing. The silence is deafening.

He looks around, hopeful, desperate for signs of anybody he knows.

 _Please, let me find someone I know_ , he silently begs.

His surroundings are unforgiving in that respect. He sees no one.

 _They’re coming for you_ , the voice says.

 _If they find me, I’ll do to them what I did to that man in there,_ he thinks.

The voice informs him that he doesn’t know how to control what he’s just done.

 _I have the power and that’s all that matters_ , he tells it.

Tommy runs. He runs to the house he knows as well as his own. It might be deserted too, but he goes there anyway. The fog acts as a cover, protecting him from the others he knows are out there. The ones that want to “fix” his mind.

He sees no one as he runs. There are no neighbors about, no cars on the street. He concludes that it has to be the fog. Fog this thick would keep anyone inside. It’s so thick he can’t even see his feet. Tommy finds his way to the house by memory, by instinct.... and his call.

He reaches the front door and runs inside as if the devil is on his heels. He quickly slams the door and bolts it tight. Turning around, Tommy sees him standing there. It gives him a jolt until his mind registers who it is. He knows this one. He’s Tommy’s friend, his lover, his shadow. He is Tommy’s keeper. He calms Tommy’s fears with his presence. Tommy can face anything as long as he is near.

“They’re coming,” Adam tells him.

Tommy nods and walks to the window. Looking out, he notices that even though the fog isn’t quite as thick here, the entire neighborhood is completely dark now. Even the flood lights along the street are obscure.

He speaks to Adam in a whisper, “No lights. No one has any lights on inside their houses. No lights on anywhere.”

Adam has moved up behind him. He can do that, move without making a sound.

“They’re afraid,” Adam tells him.

“I know,” Tommy whispers.

They’re afraid of him. They’re afraid of ‘them.’

Adam’s arms encircle his waist and he holds Tommy close to him.

 _Everything will be okay_ , Tommy thinks. _Now that he is here, it will be okay._

They are close now. Tommy can feel them. So can Adam. Together they wait. They wait for ‘them.’ And when they arrive, Tommy will make them sorry.

 

2.

Rain hits the window pane in a muffled, steady stream. Tommy lies on his side in bed, holding himself still. He wonders how long he’s been asleep. He doesn’t remember lying down. He remembers coming here, finding Adam, wondering how his world got to this point, and then…. nothing, until waking. His memory has become disjointed. Should that worry him? Maybe.

“You needed sleep,” Adam says, and Tommy realizes he’s lying behind him. He didn’t feel Adam’s presence when he woke and that bothers him. “I haven’t left you,” Adam says. “There was no absence to feel.” This makes sense to Tommy and he accepts it. They’re one.

He looks at the sky. It’s gray and heavy, releasing torrents of water. He hears small tinkling against the glass and wonders if hail is mixed in with the rain. There will be no sun today and Tommy wonders briefly if ‘they’ control that, too. The dimness of the room and the darkness of the sky make him more tired. He sits up slowly. His eyes focus on a raindrop and follows its halting path down the window pane. It’s hypnotizing.

“Water,” he mutters.

Adam is silent.

Still watching the raindrop, he reaches a hand behind him, feeling.

“I’m still here,” Adam says, taking his hand.

“You have a theory, don’t you?” he asks. “For what happened?”

“Doesn’t everyone?” Adam says.

“Is anyone even left?” Tommy asks.

“Yes,” Adam says. “Some.”

“They’re hiding,” Tommy says.

“Wouldn’t you?” Adam says. “Aren’t you?”

Tommy notices his mouth is dry and he feels light headed. He can’t remember a time when he didn’t feel drained and scared. He’s sure it wasn’t always this way, but he doesn’t remember when it began. He stands, letting go of Adam’s hand, and walks to the window. He looks across the yard, the landscape blurred by the rain. He watches for any sign of movement outside. His pulse jumps when the branch on a bush to his left waves. His gaze snaps to it, focusing, scrutinizing, then realizes it was the wind causing movement.

“They won’t come for you,” Adam says behind him. “Not yet. They didn’t count on you. They’ll come, but not yet.”

No, he guesses ‘they’ didn’t count on him. He wonders what ‘they’ did count on, though. This was an average neighborhood, set on the outskirts of the city. They were a gated community with the usual Homeowners Association that dictated the look and feel of the neighborhood, and they remained fairly secluded. Outsiders were few and far between and usually a relative of someone in the neighborhood. So how did all of this happen? The illnesses, the panic, the strangers? The deaths?  

Tommy turns. Adam is sitting up, watching him. 

“There will be no mercy if they catch you,” he hears Adam say, but Adam didn’t open his mouth. He spoke straight into Tommy’s mind. 

 _No, there won’t_ , Tommy thinks with resolve. Adam smiles.

The results were different for those who survived. Everyone in the neighborhood became severely ill, but those who recovered found themselves inexplicably equipped with some sort of extra trait, a talent almost. Adam developed a sharp ability to hear thoughts and influence their patterns. He and Tommy fell ill at the same time – headache, fever, weakness, delusions. Tommy’s fever rose so high that his body convulsed, his mind pushed outward and a tree in the backyard had exploded into flames as his fever broke.

“We need to get out of here,” Tommy says.

“Others have tried,” Adam says.

Tommy thought as much.

“Did they make it?” he asks. “Do you know?”

Adam shakes his head. “I don’t hear them anymore, but I couldn’t tell you if they escaped or were caught.”

Tommy nods, biting his lip.

“I wonder where they’ve taken the others?” he says.

Once ‘they’ figured out some of the residents recovered from the illness, they came quickly in armored trucks. They locked Tommy’s neighbors and friends in the back and left. Tommy, recently recovered, hid under his bed until he could no longer hear the heavy engines, the pounding footsteps, the shouts.

“Do you think they’re still alive?” he asks.

“Stop thinking,” Adam says. “Just feel.”

He crooks his finger at Tommy, smiling. Whenever Adam smiled at him, Tommy’s world got lighter. Even in the midst of this dreary hell.

 

The rain is still sliding down the window. Maybe it’ll rain forever. Tommy stares at the gray sky. Night is falling, eliminating what little light managed to appear during the day. Adam’s body is warm against his back; his steady breath in his ear. Tommy shivers.

 _The well_ , he thinks. _It’s in the well._  

 

3.

The sun is shining today. Tommy’s glad to see it. He opens the front door and looks up. It seems like the sky has been dark for years. He smiles at the blue above him and for one brief second, he forgets all the bad things that happened. His heart feels hopeful and he breathes in deeply. He looks out at his neighborhood, the houses lined on his street. The stillness is disturbing. He realizes there is no movement, no wind, no sounds, and his smile fades. The atmosphere is laden with dread. Dread that’s waiting. Just waiting.

He turns his head to look up the opposite side of the street. Nothing. The thought that he’s being watched hits him suddenly and his throat almost closes. He backs up and shuts the door, locking the deadbolt. That won’t keep ‘them’ out if they want in, but it still gives Tommy a semblance of safety.

“Sense of safety is important,” Adam says. “Even if the impression is thin.”

Tommy nods his agreement.

“It’s so quiet out there,” Tommy says. “Nothing is moving.”

Adam doesn’t respond.

“Isn’t anything alive?” Tommy feels desperation rising.

“Some are still here,” Adam says.

Tommy’s throat feels thick and he tries to swallow, fighting back panic. Anyone left is as scared as him. Could they ban together? Could they fight whatever has hold over them, or at least escape? Normally, Tommy would be among the first to stand up and fight, but he’s so tired.

“They put it in the well,” Tommy states, his voice carrying no feeling.

His thoughts are hazy, but he remembers strangers at the shared well. They drove a white van, nothing on the side to indicate a company or identity in any way. The top of the well was off and propped against the concrete side. The two strangers in green jump suits were leaning over the edge, peering down. His memory fails after that, but it’s the only snapshot he’s got and he dwells on it, hoping to see a clue or remember more.

“We were an experiment,” he says.

He looks to Adam for confirmation. Adam doesn’t confirm or deny, but Tommy knows. An experiment. Whoever the strangers were, they had put something in the water, which was shared by the neighborhood and guaranteed to be consumed by every member.

Tommy feels tears fill his eyes, rage throb in his heart. His friends, his family, his neighbors, and hell, even people he didn’t like, were infected and suffered. 

“What...” he begins. “Did they just want to see what would happen?”

“Probably,” Adam says.

“What the hell was it, Adam?”

“I don’t know,” Adam says quietly, shaking his head.

“What if it’s not just us?” The thought chills his spine. “They could’ve done this somewhere else, too.”

“There’s no way to know right now,” Adam says.

Tommy peers out of the window, longing to stand in the sun and be warm again. He leans his head against the window pane, his gaze drifting. He places a hand on the pane. His brain feels like it’s full of the cotton batting his mom used to sew into the quilts she made. The glass grows warm underneath his palm. He spreads his fingers, feeling them move as through a warm liquid. He realizes he’s humming, but he doesn’t know what the tune is or where he’s heard it before.

When he pulls his hand away from the window an imprint is left behind. He could burn down the entire neighborhood merely by touch. It’s an intriguing thought, a powerful thought. That fact is what has kept him safe so far, as flimsy as that safety is because at some point, ‘they’ will figure out how to handle him. His lips curve into a slight smile as the sun reflects off the new shape in the window.

He turns back to Adam. The room is empty.

“Adam?” he whispers.

He can’t sense Adam anywhere and he calls again, louder. He runs to the bedroom, his panic rising, and he shouts a third time. He feels a hand on his arm and turns around. Tommy wraps his arms around Adam’s waist, pressing his face into his chest, his breath quick and driven by desperation.

Adam pets his hair and holds him until his panic subsides. Tommy didn’t used to be so scared. Now he jumps at everything.

“It’s the absence of control,” Adam says. “You’re scared because you can’t find control.”

“Why haven’t they come for me?” he asks. “There are materials that are heat resistant. What do they want?”

“To break you,” Adam says.

Tommy shakes his head, not knowing how to reply or feel about that.

“It’s what they do,” Adam says. “And they have plans for you.”

A shudder goes through Tommy and he pulls away from Adam. This idea chills him more than the idea of death. He doesn’t want to be trapped here or captured and trapped elsewhere. Adam’s right, there is no control in what happens to him and when. Tommy’s not used to that.

“I don’t want to stay here forever,” Tommy says. “They won’t let us anyway.”

“Escape,” Adam says.

Tommy nods. It’s the only option in his mind. His instinct is to go now, but his mind holds him still. It’s daylight and they can be seen easily. They’ll wait. They’ll wait for nightfall, then sneak away.

 

4.

Tommy looks out at the neighborhood lit by street lamps and a full moon. Again, no lights on in any houses. Tommy and Adam hadn’t turned on any lights either. The need to stay hidden from ‘them’ is strong in those still alive. Tommy paced back and forth, twisting his hands, watching the light fade from the room as the sun went down. It was such a long wait. Now that night is here and the time to escape unnoticed is now, he’s apprehensive. He looks at Adam. Neither speaks. Tommy knows Adam will follow him without question.

Tommy unlocks the backdoor carefully, opens it with painstaking slowness to minimize any noise or movement that might be seen. When it’s open enough for them to fit through, he pauses, waiting. The night air is cold and still. He can’t see or sense anything. His breathing is so shallow that he feels weak, but he doesn’t want to make any more movement than necessary in case any of ‘them’ are watching. He slips out of the door, pressing himself against the door jam, sliding his back along it so the door itself doesn’t move any further. Once out, he crouches down and pauses before moving again.

The woods are to his left. If they can make it into the woods without detection, they’ll be okay. He and Adam had an intimate bond with these woods. They spent a lot of time there when their relationship began. It was easy to hide there, and the trees walled off the noises they elicited from each other. They were always shielded in these woods and this will be no different. They’ll run to the edge of the neighborhood, cross the highway, and be free. They’ll disappear into the rest of society and never found by ‘them.’ These optimistic thoughts come to Tommy in short bursts, like electric shocks. The idea of freedom so close and exciting and impossible all at the same time.

Tommy moves quickly, taking it on faith that Adam is following close behind. His heart is thudding, the noise vibrating in his ears. He holds his breath in effort not to make noise. The wood line gets closer and closer, until he passes over it. The relief is palpable, and something not felt in a long time. Tommy forces himself to control his breath, taking it deep but slowly, calming his heart and flooding his brain with oxygen. Adam smiles at him, shared memories all around them. Tommy takes Adam’s hand and they move through the woods. They step carefully, silently, but move quickly. Tommy keeps his free hand out to avoid running face first into a tree. He’s confident, though, the trees will protect them as they have always.

It seems like hours before Tommy sees a break in the foliage ahead. The moon shines brighter, outlining the edge of the woods. Tommy smiles. His hand tightens around Adam’s. Almost there. He stops at the edge of the woods, Adam stopping right behind him. He looks left and right, and, seeing nothing, moves out of the woods in a run. The highway is straight ahead, although it’s unusually silent. It doesn’t matter. It’s their finish line, so to speak. Once they’re over the highway, on the other side, they’re free.

Tommy slows his run the closer he gets, his smile fading. He can’t be seeing this. The silver glinting off the moonlight is out of place and he can’t figure out what it is or why it’s there. As they get closer, Tommy realizes what it is - a fence. It’s taller than any fence he’s ever seen and looking from left to right, it spans further than he can possibly see. His hope bottoms out and dies. He stops, staring at the tangled monstrosity before them. He can see the wire is tightly woven and barbs poking out at random.

“What is this?” he asks flatly.

He looks to Adam, who is scrutinizing the fencing. Tommy knows he’s picking up the leftover voices surrounding its placement.

“It’s razor wire wrapped in barbed wire,” he says. “They’ve trapped any survivors until they can determine what to do.”

“I can burn this, right?” Tommy asks. “It’s just metal. Metal can melt.”

Adam shakes his head slightly, frowning as he continues to stare at the fence. “It’s high-tensile wire, which is heat resistant. And those barbs will shred anyone who tries to climb it. They know about you. And you’re highly dangerous.”

“I can try,” Tommy says. “It may take longer, but it can be done. I have to try.”

He reaches out to grab part of the wire, intending to hold on to it until it melts and they can pull it away enough to create a hole and escape through it.

Adam grabs his wrist, his grip hard, and pulls him back.

“It’s electrified,” he says quietly.

Tommy snorts. “Electric fences aren’t strong enough to kill.”

“This one is stronger,” Adam says. “It’s been engineered to be stronger.”

“Will it kill me if I touch it?” Tommy asks.

“I don’t know,” Adam says. “I’d rather not find out.”

“What are we supposed to do now?” Tommy asks, trying to keep his voice down.

Adam shakes his head. He doesn’t know. Neither does Tommy. He feels his heart lurch in despair. This was for nothing. He looks back at the fence. Can he melt it by will alone without touching it? When his fever broke the tree in the backyard caught fire and he hadn’t been touching that.

“Try it,” Adam says quietly.

Tommy focuses on a spot in the fence that doesn’t look particularly tight. He can melt it and it’ll fall away so they can get through. Freedom is so close. It has to be, otherwise...

He can feel heat building inside him, radiating outward. The air in front of him becomes visible, waving, and hazy. Sweat begins to slide down his temples and the back of his neck. He clenches his teeth, feeling his jaw lock. It has to work.

“Tommy, stop,” Adam says.

Tommy grits his teeth harder, forcing his sight even more.

“Stop,” Adam says.

Adam takes his arm and turns him, breaking his concentration. Cool air hits his face and the internal heat begins to subside. He feels weak and sweaty and sick. Adam wipes his thumb under Tommy’s nose. It comes away covered in blood. Tommy can feel more blood run from his nose, replacing what Adam’s wiped away, and he’s so weary that his knees start to buckle. Adam holds him up.

Adam smiles. It’s full of admiration. “You tried.”

“It wasn’t enough,” Tommy says.

“It was everything,” Adam says.

Tommy hears voices, shouts, footsteps. Bodies crash through the woods towards them. Tears well up in his eyes. He’ll never understand why this happened, but he knows he’ll never have say in what happens to him again. His will is no longer his own. Freedom is gone.

Adam’s smile is loving, his embrace is strength. He nods and Tommy gives a genuine smile, feeling relief. Adam is his soul. They are one. Adam’s lips on his feel right, perfect.

Tommy reaches out and grabs the fence.

               

**Author's Note:**

> This is likely my swan song for Adommy. Maybe that's why it ends the way it does. They haven't performed together for so long and I've kind of moved on, too. It was a lot of fun. Thanks for coming along.


End file.
